prison of one's own making
1
9.3
- idiom
- Literature
:
prisión autoimpuesta
- After years of self-doubt and fear, she realized that her anxiety was a prison of her own making.
Examples
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The expectations he placed on himself created a prison of his own making, preventing him from enjoying life.
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The mind's a prison of your own making.
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His strict rules about how to live brought him to a prison of his own making, isolating him from friends.
Synonyms
A difficult situation you cause by your own choices or actions
Antonyms
How Self-Imposed
Surface Forms
Morphology
prison + of + one + own + making
The phrase literally combines 'prison' (a restrictive place) with 'of one's own making' (caused or created by oneself), so the meaning 'a situation that traps someone because of what they themselves have done' is directly derivable from the constituents. Although metaphorical, this compositional pattern is common cross-linguistically and should be clear to a B1 learner who knows the component words.
Etymology
Prison of one's own making gives a simple picture: a person builds their own walls, so the prison is literal walls and own making shows they made it themselves. So being in that 'prison' means being 'trapped' by choices or rules you caused.